After the wild success of the Perandus League Grinding Gear Games are back once again with another massive Path of Exile update. Instead of labyrinths and deadly traps the theme this time around is prophecy, and oddly enough, client optimization.

All of this comes in the form of Patch 2.3.0, which brings with it two new Challenge Leagues, the new prophecy system, a whole assortment of new spells and cosmetics, as well as a challenging end-game map designed with veterans in mind. Along with this you can expect to see numerous balance changes, new challenges to tackle, and various minor additions. 

If you're interested in a quick overview of what the Prophecy update has to offer here's the launch trailer that briefly goes over all of the features:

On the other hand, if you're interested in the specifics and have prepared an adequate amount of coffee to survive the entirety of the patch notes, I would suggest you head over to the official forums where all of them have been neatly laid out for you.

I haven't had the time to toy around with any of the Prophecy specific features just yet, so I won't comment on that, but what I will say is that the client optimization is beyond amazing! You know how Path of Exile usually takes one minute to fully launch from Steam, and the only thing you get too see while it loads is a boring black screen? Well, that's completely gone! Your experience may vary given that I have PoE installed on my SSD, but I managed to launch the entire game within the span of five seconds, which compared to the previous minute-long load time is quite the difference, to say the least.

If you've never even tried the game, but harbor at least a small bit of love for the ARPG genre, here's why I think you should try Path of Exile.